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In Memoriam Read-A-Thon

Get your reading glasses ready! On May 26th at 4pm in CMU 202, the 18th/19th Research Cluster is hosting a Read-A-Thon of Alfred Lord Tennyson’s In Memoriam. The event will feature an introduction to the poem by Dr. Charles LaPorte and Dr. Jesse Oak Taylor.

Come join us as we read Tennyson’s famous elegy aloud! You can participate as a reader or simply come to listen. We’ll take turns reading round-robin style until the poem is complete.

Participants who join in our round-robin reading will receive a gift copy of the Norton Critical Edition of In Memoriam.

Snacks and drinks will be served!

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NAVSA 2022 Reception (3/4 at 6pm)

Please join us at Shultzy’s Bar & Grill on The Ave (4114 University Way NE, Seattle, WA 98105) this Friday, March 4th at 6pm for an in-person reception in honor of NAVSA’s annual conference. No conference participation is necessary to join! Come chat about the conference, the quarter, or whatever else you like! 18/19 will buy one drink per person (21+), plus some bar food to share.

Be sure to bring proof of vaccination!

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Works-in-Progress Workshop (2/25 at 3pm)

Want to get feedback on a draft of a seminar paper, conference paper, article, or dissertation chapter relating to the 18th or 19th centuries? Join us for a works-in-progress workshop on Friday, February 25th at 3:00 pm in CMU 202. Participants should submit their drafts to Laura Gehrke at lgehrke@uw.edu by 9am on Tuesday, February 22nd. 18/19 coordinators will group participants according to the length of their drafts, matching each participant with one or two others. Participants should read these drafts before the works-in-progress workshop meeting.

This peer-to-peer workshop is designed for graduate students at any stage in the program, from first-years to those finishing their dissertations. Any draft (including partial drafts) with a loose connection to the 18th or 19th centuries is welcome.

This event will be in person. Please wear a mask.

Questions? Contact Laura Gehrke at lgehrke@uw.edu.

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In Conversation with Emma Mason

Join us on Friday, February 18th at 9:30 a.m. via Zoom for a conversation with Emma Mason about Christina Rossetti’s ‘To What Purpose is this Waste?’.

Emma Mason is a professor in the department of English and Comparative Literary Studies at the University of Warwick whose work focuses eighteenth and nineteenth-century poetry and religion.

Register for the Zoom session by clicking here.

Participants will receive a link to the poem and the Zoom meeting in their registration emails.

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Works-in-Progress Workshop (12/01 at 4pm)

Photo by mentatdgt from Pexels

Want to get feedback on a draft of a seminar paper, conference paper, article, or dissertation chapter relating to the 18th or 19th centuries? Join us for a works-in-progress workshop on Wednesday, December 1 at 4:00 pm in CMU 202. Participants should submit their drafts to Laura Gehrke at lgehrke@uw.edu by Wednesday, November 24. 18/19 coordinators will group participants according to the length of their drafts, matching each participant with one or two others. Participants should read the drafts before meeting with the other writers to provide feedback on Dec. 1.

This peer-to-peer workshop is designed for graduate students at any stage in the program, from first-years to those finishing their dissertations. Any draft (including partial drafts) with a loose connection to the 18th or 19th centuries is welcome.

This event will be in person. Please wear a mask.

Questions? Contact Laura Gehrke at lgehrke@uw.edu.

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Reading Group: Priti Joshi’s Empire News: The Anglo-Indian Press Writes India (11/18 at 4pm)

We have the honor of hosting Priti Joshi (University of Puget Sound) to talk about her new book, Empire News: The Anglo-Indian Press Writes India (SUNY Press, 2021). This is an in-person event, to be held on Thursday, November 18 at 4:00 pm in Denny Hall, Room 256 (DEN 256).

Prior to the event, participants are encouraged to read the Introduction and Chapter Two of Empire News, “Through a Glass Darkly: The Great Exhibition and the Great Indian Contractor.” Contact Laura Gehrke for PDFs at lgehrke@uw.edu. After Priti’s talk, we will have time for discussion.

Proof of vaccination and mask required.

Questions? Contact Laura Gehrke at lgehrke@uw.edu.

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Meet and Greet (10/14 at 4pm)

Meet new people, catch up with old friends, and learn about what 18/19 has planned for the 2021-2022 school year! Join us on Thursday, Oct. 14 at 4:00 pm for a fun meet and greet on the patio of Shultzy’s Bar & Grill on The Ave (4114 University Way NE, Seattle, WA 98105). 18/19 will buy one drink per person (21+), plus some bar food to share. The cozy, outdoor setting allows us to relax and socialize in the safety of good ventilation.

Bring proof of vaccination, and dress warmly!

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The Victorian Cult of Shakespeare Reading Group

Join us at 4pm on Wednesday, March 3 for an event celebrating our very own Charles LaPorte’s new book, The Victorian Cult of Shakespeare: Bardology in the Nineteenth Century, out now from Cambridge University Press. Charles will give a short talk about his book at the beginning of the event, and then there will be plenty of time for discussion.

Prior to the event, we will be reading the Introduction and parts V and VI of Chapter One. Readings will be made available to those who register for the event. You can also listen to Charles talking about his book on the Folger Shakespeare Library podcast Shakespeare Unlimited by clicking here.

This event will take place on Zoom. Registration required: https://washington.zoom.us/meeting/register/tJAlduCvqzIoGdekfvdcUaH6GlXdLU5jKKRO

Direct questions to Laura Griffith at lgriff2@uw.edu.

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Valentine’s Day Reading Group 02/11

Join us for a casual reading group meeting in which each participant contributes one short, Valentine’s-Day-themed text to share and discuss. Texts can be poetry, prose, or images, and they can address anything related to love, hearts, St. Valentine, or anything else that strikes you as appropriate to the theme.

This event will be held on Zoom at 4pm Pacific Time on Thursday, February 11, 2021.

Registration required. To register, click here: https://washington.zoom.us/meeting/register/tJwvceytrj0rGNRE7D8weakg9laKC1CVk_MN

Once you register you will receive a confirmation email that contains the link to the Google Drive where participants can upload their texts.

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Douglas Ishii on academic publishing

On Thursday, Nov. 19, 2020 the Eighteenth- and Nineteenth-Century Graduate Research Cluster hosted a panel on academic publishing. Douglas Ishii, one of our panelists, was kind enough to write up some thoughts he did not have a chance to share at the panel. Here they are:

BOOK AND STUFF

Someone asked me directly (I am so sorry, I know your face and the hue of your background walls) about my experience of revising the dissertation into a book.  I am dissatisfied with my answer!  I will take this unsolicited opportunity to elaborate on my thought.


What I mean to say is that, as you fashion and refine your original contribution to a scholarly conversation over the course of one to four years, while also finding your place in the larger scholarly community, your ideas will inevitably change.  Some of those ideas will make it to a dissertation revision; others will not and will wait until “The Book.”  Your dissertation might go forward with some parts that you know are not as relevant to your thinking now as when you wrote that chapter.  Similarly, when your committee reads your dissertation, they will provide some revisions that are required to graduate, and others to think about for “The Book.”


So, my experience is particular to me because it’s been six years since graduation; it also is rather applicable as more people aspiring for tenure-track jobs take on one or more contingent or postdoctoral positions before landing one (or changing career paths).  I did not choose to focus immediately on getting a book contract, though I did do archival research and figured out chapters to add that spoke to a key question that both interviewers and my committee had about the scope of the project.  I did focus on expanding my range of scholarly publications.  The article (a part of the dissertation that did not seem relevant to the new direction of the book) and the two chapters for edited volumes (one is thinking through my “Second Book”) I wrote in my postdoc and my second lectureship provided the space of thinking and feedback that clarified the direction of the book, as opposed to the dissertation, as well as the opportunity to crystalize some conceptual issues I had been thinking about toward the end of the dissertation process.


In sum: The Book is different than the dissertation, not only because of matters of genre and audience and professionalization, but because your thinking should necessarily always be growing and shifting and reframing and crumbling in on itself and meandering in new directions.  For now, focus on your dissertation without worrying so much about The Book until your adviser says so.


“TRENDY” WORK

Laura posed a question about following trends.  I am ambivalent (as I am about most things – except for following your publishing aspirations and being present at conferences).  It is absolutely crucial to have your fingers on the metaphorical pulse of your fields, which is one way I interpret the word “trends,” because this is a way of being part of the conversation that drives us to new avenues of inquiry.  However, I disagree with people who try to frame their projects to whatever’s popping for the sheer fact that it seems buzzworthy/marketable.  Yeah, some people do get ahead by riding trends – and others don’t.  I think that writing a longer-form article or a dissertation takes so much focus and energy and work that I turn most to the vocabularies, recent scholarship, and field conversations that feel authentic and necessary in propelling my own thinking.


An anecdote: I was pulling together my exam list during the affective turn in cultural studies, and, you know, affect is one of those theoretical turns that both became part of the water while also continuing to move in new directions.  Affect theory was the beginning and end of so many conference panels those years, and it has and continues to shape my thinking.  In seeing what parts of my dissertation fit into the book, the chunk of pages in which I read an Asian American music film to speak back to the deracination of certain new materialisms was the first to hit the cutting room floor.  However, the larger questions that the affective turn has helped me ask and answer about emotionality, collectivity, and political inclination remain relevant as ever.

BOOK REVIEWS

Laura posed a question about if and when to start doing book reviews, and Marshall offered a great answer.  I just want to build on that advice.  I will be encouraging my grad advisees to think seriously about their first book review post-exams.  Since the purpose of exams is to demonstrate your knowledge of cultural and critical fields, all of that reading becomes the foundation from which your review will draw.  As you think about your prospectus and dissertation, you will have to make the full transition from identifying what a piece of scholarship doesn’t do to recognizing what a piece of scholarship does do, and how that makes an intervention in the larger critical conversation.  With a fresh take on the state of the field and a mind toward thinking seriously about contributions and interventions, graduate students, I have found, make for really great reviewers.  (Do not write the snarky yelp-style review focused only on shortcomings and limits.  No one likes that dude.)


Another anecdote: my first academic publication was an unsolicited book review.  I chose a field-specific journal in which I wanted my name to appear that I knew also published book reviews.  I went to the journal’s site and read their note from the Reviews Editor to see if they took unsolicited book review proposals.  (I hope you’re not reading this as talking down, sometimes I literally needed and still need someone to tell me to check with the publication.)  The way my experience worked out is that I wrote an email to the Reviews Editor with a fresh-off-the-presses book in mind; I was already a fan of the author, and from watching her at conferences I knew that the book would be relevant to my dissertation.  The Reviews Editor agreed and, after a 4-month period of submitting an original draft, revising, and checking proofs, the rest is history.  The Reviews Editor remains a treasured mentor I delight in seeing at conferences; the author read the review in preparing her tenure file and we had a wonderful conversation about my dissertation; and it turns out some people found it helpful!

A side note: after your first book review, I might encourage you to look seriously into your first full-length, peer-reviewed article.  Especially if you do a great job, the journal or related journals might solicit a book review from you.  Which is great!  But know that a 3p. book review will not carry the same value as a 15-24p. piece of original inquiry.